Windfarm cash still available for groups

A couple of months ago, Gillian Arnot of Scottish Power Renewables presented a cheque for £207,000 to Mark Fletcher, chairman of North Carrick Community Benefit company.

The company has been set up to distribute funds received from the windfarm development at Dersalloch. This will be repeated for the next four years bringing a total of £1,035,000 after which the payment will increase to £345,000 per year for the following 20 years.

So far, local community councils have received a total of over £20,000 to distribute small grants to organisations in their areas.

In addition, ten North Carrick organisations have been successful in applying for grants totalling over £40,000 and a further £30,000 has been ring-fenced for groups who are looking for match funding or finishing consultations.

This means that there are still funds available from this year’s first allocation with the next deadline being February 10.

Mr Fletcher said, “We are inviting applications from groups who are looking for up to £5,000. Ideally, we would like people to seek match funding, or in-kind contributions, to try to achieve the maximum impact with the funds we have available to us.

“To enquire or apply to this fund please contact Marion Young on 01292 612626 or your community council representatives.

“You can also contact the company directly on ncarrickcb@gmail.com.

“The closing date for this round of applications is February 10 for review by the board later in the month. Applications after the 10th will be reviewed in May.”

NCCBC is a company set up across all of North Carrick with representatives currently from four community council areas with space on the membership and the board for community representatives from Minishant.